Guides for Musicals, Plays, Operas & Operettas

Deeply in debt to Omar, a moneylender, Abu Hassan and his wife come up with a scheme to fake their deaths in order to extract funeral money from the Caliph. Meanwhile, Omar tries to woo Hassan’s wife, Fatime, in exchange for canceling the debts. She gives him a noncommittal answer to evade his ad...
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The nymph Galatea and the shepherd Acis are in love. The shepherd, Damon, advises them both. Meanwhile, the monster Polyphemus is jealous and threatens Acis, while Coridon, another shepherd, advises him against violence. Polyphemus, however, crushes Acis with a massive stone. In response the half...
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The opera concerns the question of whether the beautiful Adelia has kept her virginity. In fact, she has been having a secret affair with a young count, Oliviero. Given that nobleman and commoners are forbidden to date, Adelia’s father is enraged when he finds out about the affair causing furthe...
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A three act opera about a young painter, Salvini, who falls in love with the fiance of the wealthy and powerful Lord Adelson, Nelly. Nelly's uncle, Struley, outlawed from Ireland, where the opera takes place, for some unspecified political offense, and a bitter enemy of Adelson, uses this passio...
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The action takes place in the year 1730 in Paris. Adriana Lecouvreur, an actress at the Comédie-Française, is in love with Maurizio, the Count of Saxony. However, he cannot decide if he loves Adriana or the Principessa for much of the opera. The show centers on the rivalry between Adriana and t...
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Upon hearing the news that her husband, the Emperor Claudius, has died during a storm at sea, Agrippina Agrippina plots to secure the throne for Nero, her son by a previous marriage. With the support of Pallas and Narcissus, Nero is hailed as the new Emperor before the Senate. However, it turns...
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A tragic tale of forbidden love, Aida follows the struggle of the Ethiopian princess, Aida, and the young Egyptian warrior, Radamès, to decide between love or loyalty to their countries. Aida has been captured by the Egyptians, who do not know her true identity, and is being held as a slave. She...
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The opera explores the rise and fall of the œheretic Pharaoh, Akhnaten. Akhnaten's short-lived but world-shattering reign was marked by his imposition of a monotheistic religious tradition on society that lead to immediate upheaval in the realms of artistic expression, architecture and social mo...
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In the small town of Loxford in East Sussex, the old-fashioned autocrat Lady Billows is in a tizzy. She has assembled a committee of the most important people in town to try to find a suitable Queen for their annual May Day Feast, but none of the young women in town are of suitable moral charact...
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